**

“The vast majority of American voters believe media bias is alive and well – 83% of likely voters said the media is biased in one direction or another, while just 11% believe the media doesn’t take political sides.”

And no wonder. News programming today often makes little distinction between news reporting and commentary, and the journalist is often as important as the news itself.

But distinctions matter. Journalism can never be truly “unbiased.” By the time we read any news article or watch any news segment, even the most “objective” news has been run through a series of bias filters. Each news department selects which stories to cover and which reporters to cover it. Each reporter selects which aspects of a story to focus on and which details of all possible details to include in the story. And editors make selective changes to fit a variety of criteria.

But recognizing this inherent bias, doesn’t mean we should stop insisting on some objectivity. Journalists can still choose to report mainly on the who, what, when, where, and why, and refrain from subjective assessment. They can still do their best to be fair and cover both sides of an issue, reporting that some people disagree about reported facts, and quoting the subjective assessments of people on multiple sides of an issue. And news programs (and bloggers who report the news) can still make a clear distinction between news reports and commentary.

This distinction is an important one for me because it goes to the issue of trust. With the blurring of the distinction between reporting and commentary, to trust the news, we must place more trust in the news organization (with all its corporate influences), which can then lead to an abuse of that trust in the form of completely subjective reporting that serves only the bias. If we can’t trust the organizations, then we’re left only with individuals – whether reporters, commentators, or bloggers – and many of these have little credibility beyond zeal. Stephen Colbert’s incredible humor and influence come from playing off this so perfectly, and the fact that some people don’t recognize the Colbert irony is a testament to what they are not recognizing in actual news programming.

And it’s a good reminder for PR pros. While subjective assessment (“the leader in…”) certainly has its place, hype-free objective reporting encourages trust and ultimately coverage.

While I’d like to think the Zogby poll indicates healthy skepticism, I fear it indicates growing cynicism about an environment in which persuasiveness comes all too often from celebrity and the amount of noise one makes.

Another deception is getting play in this New York Times article (as noted in GMSV today). The problem this time is with Wikipedia. In short, a respected editor who used the name Essjay and was supposedly a tenured professor of religion at a private university and an expert in canon law turns out to be a 24-year-old who attended a number of colleges in Kentucky and apparently has no relevant degree.

Most curious, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales initially defended Essjay, accepting the editor’s claim that he’d hidden his identity to protect himself from reprisals for mediating disputes between Wikipedia contributors. According to the NYT article, Wales also stated that the editor “is now, and has always been, an excellent editor with an exemplary track record.” Wales later reversed himself saying that his “past support of Essjay in this matter was fully based on a lack of knowledge about what has been going on,” which really doesn’t at all explain his initial defense or his reversal.

Protecting ourselves by hiding our identity can sometimes be a smart thing to do, and anonymity is often debated in PR. But anonymity is not the same as deception. If I reveal I’ve chosen not to disclose my identity, then it’s up to readers to choose whether or not to take me as credible. I haven’t deceived anyone. Wikipedia’s Essjay lied about his credentials, pretending to have experiences he never had in order to assume a position of authority. The difference is huge, and it’s hard to see what part of this Wales didn’t get immediately.

And what about lying about one’s identity for career advancement? George Eliot? I don’t think so. Actually it’s closer to the fraud perpetrated by Stephen Glass. Essjay was not writing fiction. He was pretending to be an authority on religion, and he used that authority to mediate arguments. Even if Essjay is as knowledgeable about religion as a tenured professor, his readers should have known the truth about what that knowledge was based on.

This deception sits at the heart of social media and our online interactions. How can we ever know that a person or company we encounter on the Internet is honestly represented? Initially, we can’t. In the offline world, eye contact, a handshake, a feeling we get when we enter a building all help, but even with these, we are often deceived. As more and more of our lives are conducted online, we’ll need to develop new ways of sensing deception, whether through new technology or through social media mechanisms that allow us to get feedback from the crowd – some of these are already emerging (though how can we be sure they are legit?).

The ramifications for PR are clear. Our weapons against a heightened fear of being deceived – and its consequence, cynicism – are more transparency and less hype, a lesson that needs to be passed on to clients as well.

We’ve all seen declarations that print and other traditional media are "dead," but there’s another more interesting trend – the evolution of traditional journalists as they adapt to the new media world.

For decades now, reporters have been filing stories electronically. My brother covered the Exxon Valdez spill for the Anchorage Daily News in 1989 using a Radio Shack TRS-80 (aka "Trash 80") handheld computer.

But the trend of the one-man electronic media show is a newer phenomenon. The convergence in electronic devices, and the increasing financial pressures faced by all traditional media outlets, have resulted in a parallel convergence of skills and responsibilities for the journalist. A quick look at Monster.com reveals job descriptions for reporters that include things like "daily responsibilities include, but are not limited to, reporting, shooting, non-linear editing, writing and producing." This sounds more like the description of the responsibilities of an entire news organization, not a sole reporter.

Much has been written about the general trend toward mobility, and the role played by economic necessity, device convergence, and the need for mobility in a competitive world. Greg Olson, of Eastwick client Coghead, coined the term Going Bedouin in an analysis of this trend.

Journalists, too, are seeing the advantages, both economic and competitive, of adapting the tools of the mobile workplace. Many of them have "Gone Bedouin" as they follow breaking news around the country and around the globe.

Recently, Eastwick chatted about "backpack journalism" with Haven Daley, video journalist with Associated Press (AP) TV. Daley travels the U.S., reporting on breaking news, writing, producing, editing and transmitting finished reports for a global audience. In fact, at the recent CES show, Daley produced 20 stories and commented that lately, he's more likely to be found "working out of a Starbucks" than an AP office. So-called backpack journalists -- including many converted "old-school” journalists -- were a common sight not only at CES but at DEMO, toting digital cameras and audio recorders to capture interviews and b-roll content.

Arguably, the distinction between a journalist and a blogger may soon disappear. Bloggers posted some of the earliest and most moving accounts of Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath, and during the London subway bombings, passengers were feeding images to the press from their camera phones.

So where will this all lead? Clearly, this trend will continue as the economic and competitive pressures that spurred it remain. Does the role of backpack journalist automatically mean a decline in editorial quality, as the additional responsibilities of camera operator, producer, and webmaster leave less time for research, editing, and even reflection on the nuances of a story? Are there benefits (other than economic) such as faster filing, more timely reporting, a more coherent finished piece? As Paul Harvey says, “stand by – for news!”

The label that is. Steve Rubel
calls for the end of the use of social
media because: “In 2006 all media
went social.” Continues Rubel: “So as
we roll into 2007, it’s fair to say that ‘social media’ as a separate entity is
dead. This will only accelerate as individual publishers add employees and
build networks of sites that compete with the big boys. Need proof? Look at
what Om Malik and Michael Arrington accomplished this year.”

Yes, there’s certainly less and less distinction between
social media and mainstream media, but it’s hard to believe a label can become extinct
so quickly. And I suspect we will keep
it around for a while, even if it’s only to explain how media has changed so
dramatically in the last couple of years and credit those who introduced, uh, social
media.

The more interesting question is what happens from here as
bloggers become business owners with advertising revenue to protect. One of the
most interesting characteristics of social media so far has been the number of distinct
voices beholden to no one and willing to challenge everything. Do they go mainstream and lose their punch? As the technology-fueled
distinction between mainstream and social media disappears, the new distinction
may be between mainstream media and independent voices, how individuals move
from one to the other, and where we choose, if we choose, to place our trust.

Paul Gillin, tech journalist veteran and social media pro, will be delivering the keynote.Paul will be discussing how the “New Influencers” are disrupting media and markets.I’ve been thinking a lot about these new Web 2.0 gods and where they fit into the ecosystem of PR and media.Are these new heavyweights (c’mon, you know who I’m talking about… Do you want me to recite the litany? Okay then, let’s start with one variation on the Trinity -- Om Malik, Michael Arrington, and Scoble -- and leave it at that … for now) really the Barbarians at the Gate of the stuffy, paralyzed world of “old media” or are they just repackaged media élites, as guided by their own tastes as any cigar-chomping editor in a dusty newsroom (actually, it appears that Om is also partial to cigars).

“While anyone is free to launch a blog, contribute to Wikipedia or publish photographs on Flickr, a relatively small number of activists often dominate proceedings on Web 2.0 sites. Although they are unpaid, they can nonetheless achieve an elite status reminiscent of the old media's professional gatekeepers.”

So, we’ll see what Paul and other participants in the SNCR have to say about this.

Other things I’ll be interested in hearing that day: Rob Pongsajapan of Georgetown University (my alma mater) will be moderating a panel on the “Emergence of Blogging in University Admissions and Recruiting.”

Finally, eastwikkers alum (and a SNCR Research Fellow) Giovanni Rodriguez will be discussing his work on the 33 wikis project (started here on eastwikkers).Can’t wait to hear what Giovanni’s got for us.

Writes Hof: “It does seem ironic that the world’s most prominent
Internet company – one that’s specifically trying to get us all to do our work
online instead of on the desktop – chose to brief mostly print publications.
Maybe I should be glad even Google thinks print matters. But for such an
innovative company, the tactic sure looks like a throwback.”

Well, yes, PR is the same as ever. While we often focus on
how new technologies are changing the way we communicate and do business, good
PR pros will use any technology and any technique they think will be most
effective. Doing what’s expected – even if it's usually effective or very cool – is not required or necessarily the best
strategy, and employing a “throwback” can itself generate buzz –
witness all the attention Google’s strategy is getting. In fact, by its willingness to comment on
everything, the blogosphere continues to create more opportunities not just to
innovate but also to experiment.

We’ve all read about the challenges newspapers are facing with a decline in print circulation, job cuts, etc. But, as The New York Times reports, “there is one corner of the profession still enjoying a boom: journalism schools.” And for these graduates, it will be all about new media and “multimedia-tasking” with blogs, podcasts and video clips.

This was reinforced when I saw an email from my alma mater, U.C. Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism, addressed to “New Media Graduates” detailing a reporter job opening at MSN Money. The successful candidate should have tech/video skills (Flash, etc) and “programming skill a huge plus.” These new media-savvy reporters would basically produce “packages” – part print, part photo, part video and more. I graduated from the program in 1997 and what a change in the required reporter skill-set since then. Back then, “packages” and “sound bites” were relegated to the world of TV news. We’re keeping on how journalism (think grass roots, participatory type as well) is being transformed by new media. Also important to note: with blogs, let the journalist (traditional or otherwise) beware. Incorrect reporting is exposed and dissected – openly – given the transparency of new media.

With the mind-boggling (or is it mind-numbing?) proliferation of blogs, vlogs, flogs, blawgs, splogs, plogs, et cetera, we who are in the business of tracking and listening to conversations have been presented with a number of pretty good (and not so pretty) tracking tools.Some of my favorites, and those used most often by the Research Dept. here at Eastwick, include Technorati (natch), Feedster (when it’s humming), and PubSub. Google's blog search tool is also assuming a larger role in our arsenal.

But an often-overlooked venue, one that’s been with us for many years and is still very relevant to LOTS of people, is the message board.Now, thanks to BoardTracker.com we can search message boards and other forums with relative ease. As of five minutes ago, BoardTracker claimed to be tracking 16,149,892 threads in 26,016 forums.Not every community has jumped on the blogging/wiki train yet, so having a useful way to monitor these conversations is great.It gets me thinking, though, with all the innovations in social media, will Web 2.0’s forgotten step-brother—the message board—be on its way out?

After reading a recent article about some Washington Post reporters asking to be paid extra for contributing to a group Web log (question: I wonder if many outlets will shift from encouraging blogging to making this a reporter requirement)… I got to thinking about that recent Fast Company article listing “Six Jobs That Won't Exist In 2016.” On the list: Auto mechanics, Indian call-center operators and bloggers.

With all that’s been written on the blogger’s creed and the reporter’s creed and efforts to map where the two intersect (Is a blogger who provides a first-hand account of an event, with credible facts and sources, a [temporary] journalist? What defines a journalist and what is considered news… especially in the age of real-time blogs, podcasts, etc.?), and, for PR pros, tips on building relationships with bloggers, it’s clear that blogs – as an information source and more – have made their mark on the new media landscape.

Hard to imagine a blog-less world, especially when it’s so easy to find bloggers who make posting their passion, writing entries daily (with no pay). Unless of course the assumption is that blogging in 2016 won’t be a separate “job” so to speak with extra pay, but instead will be absorbed within various job descriptions (example: while blogging is an additional task for many reporters now, could the day come when it is assumed that a blog post will automatically, always follow a written article?)